oh i'm john martin in washington d.c. and here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture over no votes united states in israel yesterday the united states or the united nations excuse me elevated the new member status of the palestinian authority what does this move mean for negotiations in the middle east and what's the best way to achieve a two state solution laskar panel in tonight's special bigger picture discussion on the middle east also isn't it a failure of the so-called free market would be a boil companies are allowed to run around polluting our environment at the expense of our health and lives that and more into night's big picture rubble and drones are supposed to be used in combat situations with our enemies and yet we're using

them against people in nations that were allies with what kind of precedent are we setting for the future of drone warfare across the globe share my thoughts into that steely take. tonight we have a special bigger picture discussion on the middle east history was made in new york city yesterday as the united nations general assembly approved a resolution that implicitly recognizes palestinian statehood in a vote of one hundred thirty eight to nine with forty one nations abstaining the u.n. elevated the palestinian authority's u.n. observer status from entity to nonmember state so what are the ramifications of that un decision and what are the key issues preventing peaceful and constructive negotiations between israel and the palestinians joining me now is dylan jay williams director of government affairs at the pro peace pro israel group j. street and dr hussein ibish senior fellow at the american task force on palestine

a.t.f. heat and executive director of the hawse a law suit a foundation for arab american leadership thank you both for joining me thank you very much pronouncing everything oh yeah. ok first of all just in general the consequences of what happened at the u.n. yesterday let's just begin with that it. remains to be seen really the the fallout is not clear certainly album as in got a bump of popularity. among palestinians in the west bank and across the board all over the world and in the arab world how much that counters the bump in popularity that how mascot from the war that they fought with israel this illusory victory that they claimed in their missile exchange with the israelis. remains to be seen i think the biggest question has to do with what kind of retaliatory action does israel take and actually carry through with and what kind of effect does this have

on palestinian relations with the west because before the can start dealing with israel again and in a constructive way they have to fix their relations especially with the united states that have been broken one quick word the israelis have said today that they want to retaliate by building three or four thousand new settlement units and particularly in the one corridor the most sensitive place in the entire occupied west bank a project which if it is completed would cut off from the rest of the west bank. the united states anticipated this a week ago secretary clinton told israel way in advance don't retaliate by building anyone publicly and does exactly what they're doing because it's probably the single most aggressive thing they could do and i think after the israeli election there has to be a serious conversation with the united states and the new israeli government about this idea of building a new one at the rate they're talking about and. dylan do you do you think

that this first of all would you characterize israel's response to the building the settlements as. as retaliatory and what's your take on what happened in the u.n. yesterday to the first question i think there's little doubt given the timing of the announcement regarding the new construction the authorization of new construction in those zone areas that it is almost certainly a response to what's her place at the united nations yesterday in terms of what the consequences of that will be in the long term i think that remains totally up to what the parties do next and not just these immediate reactions where you have obviously the israelis announcing this construction and in fact you have the united states congress considering several unhelpful steps as well including possibly restricting or cutting u.s. assistance to the palestinian authority which would only hurt israel's security and

possibly kicking the p.l.o. mission that the diplomatic mission here in the united states out of the country we feel that this is the moment despite all the hard feelings on all sides from yesterday for a new initiative towards a two state resolution because at the end of the day that's the only thing that's going to get us past these tactical differences that only exacerbate the situation we see on the ground well the other the other big thing that's happened recently is that president obama was reelected secretary clinton is going to secretary rice may be coming in or secretary kerry who knows what it's going to be but. i'm curious what your thoughts are on the how what the impact of that will be on the on that situation in the middle east i mean i think there's two impacts first of all president obama now enjoys the greater leeway inherent to a second term president but at the same time in this election he overcame a very significant and significant myth that's permeated washington political

culture for decades now and that's that you can't take bold steps toward peace without paying some price politically there with jewish american voters other. pro israel voters or even political contributors you know tens of millions of dollars were spent to paint this president and to some extent his party as insufficiently pro israel and that gambit failed completely president obama was re-elected with seventy percent of the jewish american vote nationwide that's exactly the same average as every presidential. democratic presidential candidate since the one nine hundred seventy two one exit polling again and hussein your thoughts on that and you think that susan rice would bring something to this well i don't know i mean i i i'm not sure of the personality of the secretary of state is as important as the policy decision now here's the question the united states has to ask itself he we've for the past ten years been saying to ourselves. resolving this situation a two state solution between israel the thousands is

a vital american national security interest but we continue we can't want it more than the parties themselves know that's an oxymoron either it's a vital security concern in which case we have to want it at least as much as anybody else or it's not and it's something we can defer to the parties and we can you imagine anybody saying it's a vital american concern that iran not have a nuclear weapon but we can't want that more than other countries that would be absurd so we have to decide how much we really care about this and be honest about it and and proceed accordingly and i think it would be honest. a a renewed effort has to begin by healing the relations between the palestinians and washington between the p.l.o. and washington d.c. these have been frayed to the point where it's difficult for them to function together and that has to be repaired and both sides have to work on that at the same time i think the united states has to be very clear with israel and also the

administration with congress but look anything you do to punish the palestinians by either impeding the ability of the p.a. to govern. the west bank by taking money away from them or any other retaliatory measures like that or by building in settlement areas like the one which make peace much more difficult to achieve in fact will accrue directly and immediately to the benefit of hamas and that is what you're going to do so if you want to deal with hamas if you're an israeli who prefers to war with hamas and these troops isn't prisoner exchanges to to negotiating peace with the p.l.o. in the p.a. then go for it be retaliatory if you're an american congressman or senator demagogic enough to want to grandstand and risk the national interest and promote how mass by taking out anger and grandstanding about the p.l.o. by by damaging the p.a. the benefiting hamas then do it but know what you're doing knowing what you're

doing while the political dynamic of that i think is a fairly important one to what extent do you think that this. is very fashionable in at least on right wing talk radio which i. talk radio but i'm very familiar with that world to basically gratuitously embrace israel and get to it i'm sure to dislike bash the palestinians to what extent do you think that the congressional measures that dylan was just talking about that are being talked about are basically republican or conservative or catering to the shelly right wing there are some there are some of that but there is there is. a mood that extends to democrats as well that this is not this is not a partisan issue their constituency is deeply embedded in the republican party evangelical conservatives christians united for israel etc that are that are not just pro israel but pro suttle they're pro occupation they're not actually pro

israel at all they're pro armageddon they're called religious lunatics who yearn for the apocalypse but they're but they they pose as pro israel and in effect they are you know would legislate for. pro israel in the democratic party is in bed it is a part of the mainstream jewish establishment that is uncritically pro israel or with very limited criticism of israel and you've seen a congressional leadership that was quite a lightweight on the subject many of them jewish american democrats howard berman gary ackerman others going and being replaced by people or whether republicans or democrats who frankly are less less informed less enlightened and have a simpler view of things and i do think that on all sides in the run up to the israeli election on the public's the political scene whether hamas or even some extent the way the p.l.o. handled the un bid and in congress you see people. appealing to the basis of the baser instincts of their constituency in

a way that is at the expense of getting ill and how do you see this working with regard to the american political dimension of our relationship both with the palestinian authority and with israel i think dr bush has it right there is broad bipartisan support for israel and that's a very good thing in the united states the problem comes when members of congress and to some extent administrations don't understand exactly how to express their pro israel attitudes through good policies there's a definite misunderstanding of what is actually in israel's long term interests and i come to the two state solution many politicians here insufficiently supportive of it because they simply fail to realize it is the only way for israel to retain both its jewish and its democratic character in light of the demographic shift that's taking place in the region do you think this administration gets them i think this is ministration and this president definitely understand that and we've heard it a number of times from them and the question is after a particularly bruising the last two years of their first term whether they are

again going to exhibit the political will to reengage on this process i think given the very short amount of time israel has to reach a two state resolution with its neighbors its absence. essential that they do so for israel's long term security in the minute we have before the break how long do you think the window is a very short period of time it could it could be anywhere from months to days there was already one israeli government months to hears there's already one israeli government report that kind of went unnoticed it was a tax collection report and it noted that between the mediterranean sea and the jordan river there are now about twelve million people and five point nine million of them are jews and that's and that's an area that's still a desert means that in fact its state of israel the state of israel as it actually has existed for the majority of its existence is twenty six years of it already has an r. . that's what it. that's that's a ok this is the demographic shift there right as it were ok. it's

exploded yet there you go more it's a nice bigger picture discussion of the middle east after this break. here is mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that many americans call. i'm sorry i'm just a guy who cares an awful lot of. our you know what i think terror cells. want to give us a defeat terrorism on the liberal and the christian. kids usually. you know the corporate media distracts us from what you and i should care about because they're a profit driven industry that's. garbage because that breaking news i'm having martin and we're going to break that.

sometimes you see a story. and then you. see some other part of it and realized.

welcome back to our bigger picture discussion on the middle east on our panel tonight. dr hussein and let's get back to it there was the cease fire that preceded the u.n. vote and all these other things and i'm curious your thoughts on. how that's going to hold and what you know hamas is clearly has a role in all this and that kind of freaks out the united states you know what words that go well what i think is the case is that. the entire issue was totally recontextualized by the war between hamas and israel the fact that hamas claimed victory because a weaker party confront a stronger party and survives they always claim victory big claim with egypt to

have won some concessions on the blockade which seem to be illusory they don't seem to actually be taking place and i'm. surprised by that israel never israel has denied they made those concessions and i don't think they did frankly but it doesn't matter how a loser it is there's always this moment of intoxication you know for policies or for any oppressed people when they when they're confronted the enemy and survived and we're not out it is it's a terrible illusion but it's inevitable and there but there is usually a hangover typically there is then there's the next morning where you wake up and you bury the dead and you count the costs of what not last and went through this in two thousand and nine the p.a. could point to a lot of successes on the ground in terms of improvement of quality of life and say look our approach of diplomacy security and negotiations produces better results than this fruitless pointless quixotic armed struggle they can't do that now

because of the aid cuts that have come from the west after last years ago and bit and i think that. in the content in the in that context. re redoubled the p.l.o. and president abbas a determination to do this at the u.n. to get a symbolic victory at the u.n. that could counter the a loser even korea that has mass had on the battlefield and tried to even out politically the playing field and i think one of the reasons that so many european states switched from either abstentions to yes votes or no votes to abstentions and left israel supported only by the united states canada the czech republic panama and a bunch of polynesian islands whose combined population is less than the number of israeli settlers i mean the islands you know is a pretty severe collapse and i think it was a recognition by the international community in the context of the gaza war and the frozen peace process and that's of collapse of the entire move to create two states

a really strong statement of recommitment to a two state solution was needed and a political boost for the p.l.o. and the p.a. is required. and that's why i think also there's got to be restraint on the israeli side and in congress whatever its value they want to consider because as i say it will accrue to the immediate benefit of hamas last time around a year ago when. the p.l.o. had a failed bid for full u.n. membership they got harder tell us in terms of funding and other. measures from the united states and israel hamas was in no position to take advantage of it their crisis with their relations with syria with iran and they were in disarray that is absolutely not the case now they are riding high on a wave and actually they've switched right after the ceasefire how mass is position on the u.n. bits which after years of condemning this kind of stuff they went fully behind it because they thought well now we're so popular right now it won't harm us we might

be able to take a piece of the cake and any retaliation against the p.l.o. will not affect us in gaza so we can take part of the credit and they'll take all the pain it and we don't have to worry about losing political clout to them because we've accumulated so much right now it really ought to be it needs to be a wake up call for everyone who doesn't think the palestinian movement should be defined by hamas to work together to stop that from happening because we're we were inching pretty close to it frankly and dylan well first of all your thoughts on that and then also is it possible that hamas could be approaching something like the ira did were it makes the transition from being perceived as a as an outlaw group to being a political player i think the consequences of the recent violence in and from gaza. is that the very sad part about this in addition to the terrible loss of innocent life on both sides is that we've been here before. we've been in

a situation where after cast lead there was a ceasefire but nothing really moved on the peace front and what this violence show . as i said there is not going to be a permanent resolution to this kind of violence and till there is actually substantial progress towards a two state resolution on the issue of hamas and the role it has to play i mean first of all i think hamas is a terrorist organization that neither israel nor the united states should be compelled to talk to in the context of. working towards a two state resolution however that's not to say that communication with them is not important through intermediaries it's something that israel itself has done most recently to get the cease fire and of course to free captured soldier and earlier last year are this year so it's it's something that. will have to be developed but for right now it's not something that we should expect of our ally israel to negotiate with hamas but eventually there could be a situation where you see hamas breaking into

a more political pragmatic wing that will accept peace with israel and its right to exist such as the p.l.o. did in the fact that you are the word the word is the p.l.o. because there is no debate even among policy is that the sole legitimate representative of the palestinian people diplomatically is the p.l.o. even hamas agrees with that in fact the another thing they have done since the cease fire is renew their calls to choose to restructure the p.l.o. which means they want to big piece of it they want to be part of it but here's the thing the p.l.o. has has made commitments it's signed treaties with israel has letters of mutual recognition with israel which are lopsided because they recognize israel's right to exist israel merely recognizes the p.l.o. as a legitimate interlocutor but hasn't recognized the state but hamas to become part of the diplomatic game from the palestinian national interest point of view unless it is going to damage the ability of the p.l.o. to function diplomatically house to. agree to abide by the by the

basic decisions of the p.l.o. that have already been made that the commitments that have been made. to a two state solution is there a sense that they are going to do this or that they will no i don't think so i think there is a sense that they are hoping that the changes in the arab world qatari sponsorship of friendship with president morsi of egypt the islamist president there are changes in support of turkey changes in syria that they are banking on the idea that there is some kind of arab spring or some kind of an islamic awakening and that they are on this riding this green tide to a new future of islamist domination of arab politics which i think is not going to happen although i think it's going to take some more to stop it from happening you know in so far as that's not the case then i think it's going to be and if the

united states and its allies and israel are smart it's going to be quite easy to fend off from domination of the national and taking control of the p.l.o. but i think that if in fact the p.a. is treated the way it has been over the past two years and strangled and impoverished and humiliated and and its ability to govern. made impossible and the only thing that they can show for their negotiations and their cooperation or not is more settlements in these crucial in one areas and stuff like that then i think it's going to be very difficult to stop them from either replacing or taking over the p.l.o. and that will be a disaster for the policy national movement unless they were to change their policies but why would they if their policy because they wanted people becoming what they're taking over here is a you know it here is the point it would have been armed struggle that would have gotten them there and that would be the lesson that the united states and israel and everybody would have is actually right now actively communicating to have mass

in the palace is an arms struggle gets you prisoner releases arms struggle gets you negotiations arms struggle gets you maybe some easing this is now over the borders and a lot of these and what does negotiations get you a. gets you threats it gets you settlement building it gets you humiliation of etc yeah good the incentive structure is pretty apropos apropos of the dylan williams the these settlement agreement or the cease fire agreement specific which both parties agreed to specifically says that they're going to open the israel's going to open borders and facilitate the free movement the language open the across ins and facilitating the movements of people in transfer of goods and refraining from restricting reserve residents free movements and targeting residents and border areas and procedures it would take. is are both part it while this is incumbent upon israel is israel doing this this was supposed to begin twenty four hours after the cease fire and and to what extent is this this announcement that was made today of these settlements being built. the contradiction of this agreement that they say

and how do they deal with this i think it very much for maine's to be seen what steps israel is going to take with respect to. changing or loosening its current blockade on the gaza strip you know to some extent it has already reduced the. the strength of that blockade a few years ago and we think that was a good move because ultimately the blockade in its strongest form was actually boosting hamas by which was able to get goods in through the tunnel economy making them the not only enriching them and giving them capital but they desperately needed but also enabling them as the. sole source of good essential goods and goods in the strip absolutely not and they also seem to be getting at least in many quarters sort of a moral benefit from others right but that's not to say that israel should have some reasonable restrictions on what goes into and comes out of gaza because there are obviously genuine security concerns when you have

a terrorist organization kind of running the show in the place with respect to the settlements and the the announcement of construction and the authorization of construction the one zone i mean that is something. that is to put it mildly not helpful and it could ultimately if it proceeds be a real nail in the coffin of the two state resolution and the reason this area is so sensitive perhaps more sensitive than any other area of the west bank is because this is the area that essentially separates the arab neighborhoods of east jerusalem which would be the capital of a future palestinian state from the west of the rest of the west bank where the bulk of the palestinian state would be and this is essentially should go forward taking jerusalem off the table as a final status issue which would be absolute disastrous for the prospects of a two state resolution so if we have just a minute left here how long before israel actually pulls the trigger lousy metaphor you know proceeds with construction shall we say i mean is there time to renegotiate i think there's definitely time for the israeli government to

reconsider the authorization and certainly not move forward with construction on that and in those critical months what's most important is that the united states and coronation with the international community actually put forward a new initiative that can actually get the parties progressing towards a two state resolution because this next year is actually a critical window of opportunity a window that is always closing but perhaps even faster than before. it's over results dr hussein it was dylan williams thank you gentlemen thank you very much easier thank you. to see this bigger picture discussion again or to see any of our conversations the great minds go to our website conversations of great minds dot com. coming up president obama presented his plan to avoid the fiscal cliff yesterday but it was met with a volley of sarcastic laughter from republicans will bannerman call it mcconnell and company do the right thing and strike a compromise or are we destined to fall off the cliff that and more in the night's big picture on.

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you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for you think you understand it and then something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm sorry welcome to the big picture.